Philia
by Musafreen
Summary: At the end of the day, your friends are the family you choose. A Collection of 50 Friendship Vignettes involving various characters from the series.
1. percy and nico

**notes: a collection of under-500 word things written for Yew's (whatever penname he's going by these days) BroTP Bootcamp- which is to say, things focusing on non-romantic friendship-family relationships. This set will be focusing on semi-regular updates rather than quality, so don't be surprised if a few of them make you want to smash your head against something.**

**requests are welcomed.**

* * *

_**prompt: paper**_

_**pair: percy/nico**_

* * *

Two months into Nico's sudden and completely unexpected foray into high school, Percy Jackson found himself in the presence of an incensed teenager appearing from a corner of his bedroom. Again.

"This is stupid," Nico seethed, fully throwing a book on to Percy's bed.

"Ack!" Percy replied, and scrambled desperately for a T-shirt. Nico had a way of looking at people that was slightly disquieting, and lack of upper-body clothing apparently intensified said feeling.

"English!" Nico snapped, hands waving in the air the way they tended to do whenever he got upset, "_Stupid._"

"Can't you _knock_ or something? Geez."

"They want me to read _that_. In a _week_. Are they _mad?_ Look at the _print!_"

Finally pulling on a T-shirt that afforded some measure of protection from Nico's bad mood (it was symbolic, okay? And gods, Annabeth was never going to hear about this), Percy squinted at the offending object.

"The Great Gatsby?"

Nico scowled at him

"I need to read this by Friday," he muttered, "I can't get past the third page."

"I don't think anybody in Camp can," Percy told him, "Except Annabeth. Probably."

"Then how on earth does she get past the third page?"

"Oh well," Percy shrugged, "_Annabeth_. You know."

Nico grunted, indicating that he understood that Annabeth Chase was a force of nature who was way out of the league of demi-ordinary Sons of Hades and Poseidon.

"How did _you_ cope with it, then?"

"Paul, mostly," Percy shrugged, "Goode was uh... good with that. We had teachers who didn't try to make us do the impossible."

"Any chance he'd want to transfer to my school?"

"Probably not," Percy admitted, "but he could probably help you out with the weirder bits, and I think Mom's made extra meatloaf. She's told me to tell you that if you could just announce when you're going to drop in, she could make you some hot cookies."

Percy opened his bedroom door and waved vaguely in the direction of the kitchen. After a few moments of silent (and halfhearted) protest, Nico sighed, picked up the book and followed him out.


	2. luke and thalia

_**prompt: ignite**_

_**pair: thalia/luke**_

* * *

Shoplifting is easy. He knows he's cute, and he uses smiles and charm to their full extent to distract the shopkeepers as he sneaks food under his loose coat.

She barely waits till they're out of sight of the store before pouncing on it.

"Bread," she sighs in sheer happiness, "Actual _food_. You have no idea how sucky it is foraging stuff."

He does, actually. Thievery is his Father's domain, he sure as hell was not resorting to it out of choice. He doesn't correct her though; it's hardly worth the bother- and besides, she saved his life.

He slumps down next to her as she eats. He's _tired_. The part of him that knows this is _unfair_ (he's eleven- almost twelve; he shouldn't be killing monsters with sharp objects- that goes a little beyond precocious) is raging and screaming and really just wants to sit down and let the next monster eat him up.

But this girl- she's younger than he is- and she seems to have no problem with their lifestyle. In the last one hour, she's speared through a thing with too many legs, hauled his injured ass a mile or so, and treated him with something golden and burning and obviously magical.

It makes him feel a little inadequate, to be honest. It also makes him feel a little relieved. Maybe he's not the _only_ one who has to go through all this crap. So maybe the next time he stumbles across a mythological monster trying to eat him, he won't have the fleeting thought of "what's even the _point_" before his body automatically kicks into survival mode.

"Hey, you listening?"

Thalia Grace is looking at him, one eyebrow raised and the other wriggling. He has no clue how she's managing that. Then again, he has no clue how she carried around that bloody huge shield and whacked a monster over the head with it hard enough to make it collapse, either.

"Sorry," he apologizes, "I was uh... thinking."

"I figured," she snorts, and dusts off the last of the breadcrumbs, "So, you have a name? Only I really can't be hiking across a country with a guy whose name I don't even know."

There's a part of him which immediately freezes up. Conman (because screw it, that's pretty much all his Father was, anyway) genes or the part of him which repeatedly tells him that his mother knows things she shouldn't know, and he should be careful; something's always kept him from using his real name since he's run away.

But Thalia Grace is staring at him expectantly, all bright blue eyes and freckles and studied indifference; and somewhere in her eyes beyond the cockiness, he thinks he can see a desperate need for someone else to share this hell with.

He can understand.

"Luke Castellan," he tells her, and smiles. He thinks maybe, that this could end up being not as bad as it's supposed to be.


	3. jason and octavian

_**prompt: frozen heart**_

_**pair: jason/octavian**_

* * *

Take something, slice it open, and figure out what said. According to everyone in Camp Jupiter, that was the full extent of what the augurs did. Not hardcore stuff, really.

Octavian had always wanted to wonder out aloud why he was the only Augur in his generation if that was the case, but since he was a consummate politician, all he did was smile and nod and make a joke or two.

Any smile Octavian gave right _now,_ however, was liable to be the kind that sent little kids and grown men running for cover while babbling incoherently. It helped that he was viciously slicing open his sixty-seventh sacrifice of the afternoon.

White fluff clung to his knife, spilled over the altar. Octavian raised a hand and murmured words, and got the same answer again.

_Praetor._

Usually, the fluff was much less specific than that, but it seemed like all the stuffed animals of the world had decided to be united today, just to point and laugh at his defeat. Even the frog, and frogs made careers out of being extra vague.

Octavian made a mental note to quadruple the number of sacrifices for the next three weeks.

"Octavian?"

His hands tightened on the altar and decided to make that four weeks, just because.

"Hey." Jason's voice was hesitant, apologetic, and slightly confused.

It made him want to scream, of course, but he settled for gripping the table so hard that it hurt. And then he turned around, smile in place.

"Jason," he said, brightly, "Congratulations."

"Um," Jason said, looking slightly wary, "Thank you?"

"Please," Octavian told him, still smiling, "No need to thank me for stating what should have been obvious. You went on the quest, you slew the sea serpent. You were the obvious choice to take over once Evan and Patrice retired."

"Um," Jason's wariness faded, and was replaced by one of those rare, hesitant smiles, "Thank you. Really."

"You did something nobody here has done for decades," Octavian continued, "Quest, and kills- I think you're single-handedly responsible for bringing your Cohort some form of approval and- _Reyna?_ You supported _Reyna?_"

Jason blinked at him, startled.

_"Reyna?"_

"What?" Jason stepped forward, concerned, "Octavian, what's wrong?"

"You supported her, and you're asking me what's _wrong?_"

"I didn't-" Jason said, "It's not like- you're not thinking straight-"

"You were my _friend,_" Octavian snarled, "You knew what I wanted. You knew _how much_ I wanted it."

Octavian stopped himself short of blurting out a "how could you?", because all this had enough and more in common with a soap opera as it was. The abrupt stop created a silence which was a shade beyond uncomfortable.

He saw it before it came, and had to clamp down on that tiny, silly part of him which was outraged and out-of-control and which wanted to shake Jason, tell him that he was supposed to be _his_ friend and not _hers_-

"Reyna earned it," Jason said quietly.

That whiny little voice in him stuttered to a stop and died, leaving him to clean up it's godsdamned _mess._

"Good for her," Octavian nodded, and pasted the smile back in place, "Now if you will excuse me, I must go. I expect you will want to have words with your Lord Father, anyway."

He brushed past Jason, and did not look back.


	4. percy and clarisse

**prompt: jump**

_**pair: percy/clarisse**_

* * *

"No."

Of all the _idiotic-_

"Jackson, quit being a fucking wimp!"

"I am not a wimp!" Percy said, "I'm sane. More or less. Which would be why I think it's a bad idea to _jump off a volcano!_"

Clarisse pictured Silena's voice (or what she hoped was a reasonable version of it- twenty years could wreck a lot of damage on a girl's memory) telling her to try and count to ten before resorting to her fists. It was a method which had proven itself to be surprisingly effective against everything from rude sales clerks to sadistic drill sergeants, but under Percy's overly skeptical expression, it fizzled out and died.

"This is unbelievable!" Clarisse screeched at him, "First you decide to turn tail and _run away_ from a couple if little hellhounds-"

"Which turned out to be a very good idea, seeing as how it turned out to be a Hellhound family reunion, and in what universe is ten feet tall 'little'?"

"And now," Clarisse continued, "You're too chicken to jump a couple of feet-"

"I'm not scared, I'm being sane. I could fall into lava, and it's hot down there."

"You're like ninety percent water, you dork. Also, when the Hades did _you_ get sane?"

Percy opened his mouth to retort, then hesitated. Clarisse noted with a start that there were laugh lines around his eyes, little frowns marring skin that she remembered as being smooth. All that said, he probably looked less weathered than she did.

Maybe this had been a bad idea. Maybe, after hearing rumors of breeding hellhounds, she should have gone to CHB or (ugh) Camp Jupiter and asked the younger kids to do something about it. Maybe she should have let old demons and old memories lie in the past, and not gone charging ahead in an attempt to relive it.

Or maybe she should have done all that, except with a less wimpy companion. But really, you couldn't blame her for thinking otherwise- Jackson was (had been) the least wimpiest person she knew, for all that she was unlikely to admit it to him even under pain of waterboarding. Apparently, kids mellowed out hardened warriors. Who knew?

Percy cursed spectacularly as he landed in a crouch a foot away from her.

"Nice one," Clarisse told him, appreciating the jump, "wasn't sure you could make it."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Percy's voice was positively acidic, but Clarisse could see his eyes gleam from much more than fear; so she wasn't fooled.

Old warriors retired, she supposed. Some of them even did it successfully- she was positive Annabeth hadn't given a thought to monster-maiming ever since she'd won some prize and been flooded with projects, and she _knew_ Chris greeted every hint of supernatural involvement in their life with a volley of really spectacular greek curses. Others, like her and Percy, needed to get up and charge at something once in a while, just to assure themselves that all was well with the world.

"You coming?" Percy demanded, looking back at the approaching hounds, Riptide's edge gleaming in the firelight.

"Please," Clarisse snorted and twirled her spear, "_Try_ and keep up with me."

* * *

**Note:** Clarisse does not really care about keeping the language kid-friendly, nope. And that stint in the army did nothing for her vocabulary. Y'all will have to deal with that. /nodnod


	5. percy and grover

**prompt: gasp**

_**pairing: percy/grover**_

* * *

Dressed in threadbare shorts and nothing else, Grover stared at the bane of his afternoon. The lake was calm and placidly pretty, and should have set his body singing at the beauty of the scene or something instead of making his heart pound like it was trying to get out of his chest.

Percy, who had been watching Grover watch the lake for the past five minutes, succumbed to his ADHD and sighed.

"Well? Go in already."

"There are naiads in there," Grover blurted out. The lake was, as mentioned before, calm and pretty and _clear_, so he could clearly see the girls at the bottom, staring at him and occasionally giggling at each other.

"Yeah," Percy pointed out, "They kinda live there."

Grover decided he'd use any available excuse, "I'm shy."

"What?" Percy said, nonplussed.

"I can't swim when they're in there," Grover said, starting to walk back to the Big House, "We can come back later."

Percy, who had been hearing all sorts of excuses in the past week ("Juniper said she needed to pick berries!" "Chiron wants and update on the Pan situation!" "Of _course_ the Demeter kids need me to help them grow plants- bye, Percy!") reached out a hand and grabbed him by the waistband.

"Hey!" Grover yelped.

"Gimme a minute," Percy said, not letting go of him, and stuck his head in the water.

Grover stared. Percy and his underwater thing was not news, but it was always weird to see him like that- entire head stuck in and breathing _water_-

Oh god. Breathing water. Or, to be more accurate, drowning via breathing water. He _hated_ water- water was very removed from earth and plants and other things that made _sense_.

"Okay, done," Percy said, pulling his head out of the lake (looking very not-wet) and releasing him, "They said they'd go away to the other end for a couple of hours. We can go ahead with your swimming lesson."

Why had he agreed to this again?

"Uh, Percy," Grover said, "Is this really necessary?"

Percy eyed his waistband again.

"I mean," Grover forged ahead, "It's not like I _don't_ know how to swim. I can, you know- it just-"

"You told me you almost drowned in Lake Michigan on your last trip."

"Well yeah," Grover admitted (that had not been one of his proudest moments), "But I managed. And I swear to stay away from water I can't wade through from now on. So can we not do this?"

Percy gave him a long look and said, "No."

"But-"

"You wouldn't have gone into the water in the first place if you didn't absolutely have to," Percy stated, "And none of my friends are drowning on my watch. That would be embarrassing."

"But I hate swimming!" Grover wailed, "I _keep_ going under!"

"Then you're not doing it right," Percy said, "And I can probably help you with that."

Grover sighed, recognizing the Annabeth-like stubbornness in his tone. Really, those two were spending too much time together.

"I won't let you drown," Percy said, stepping into the water and holding out a hand, "Promise."

Grover sighed again (he really couldn't _help_ it), but took Percy's hand. After all, if he _had_ to swallow water, he supposed it would be best to do it somewhere with a built-in lifeguard.

* * *

**Notes:** This should take sometime between TC and BotL. Wherein Grover's taking a week-long break in between searches, and Percy comes to Camp after school everyday to meet him because he's Percy.


End file.
